By Vincent Volcano, retired maestro of molten melodrama, scarf aflame, patience extinguished.
Flames Fade, but Classics Burn Forever!
Ah, Crime 101. A 140-minute graduate seminar in How to Audit Michael Mann Without Getting Caught. Bart Layton, who once staged true-crime with nervy verve, now turns in a glossy LA heist opus that keeps checking the syllabus to make sure “Heat homage” is spelled “H-E-A-V-Y-B-R-E-A-T-H-I-N-G-S-Y-N-T-H-S.” There’s scope, there’s sheen, and there’s Chris Hemsworth brooding so efficiently you could run a jewel-polishing mill off the wattage of his cheekbones. Unfortunately, wattage is not the same as character.
Plot, such as it is: A lone-wolf jewel thief (Hemsworth) conducts precision heists up and down the 101 like a Waze route sponsored by De Beers. He’s ethical (no blood, just baubles), introverted (murmurs like a prestige-streaming protagonist), and saving for That One Big Number because crime movies still think criminals retire to artisanal coastal shacks after one last score. Mark Ruffalo, eternally stuck on “Detective, unshaven, regrets,” plays Lou Lubesnick, a cop so dogged you can smell the Icy Hot, while Halle Berry’s insurance investigator slices through boardroom sexism and plot contrivance with equal elan. Enter Barry Keoghan as Ormon, a chaos goblin subcontracted by Nick Nolte’s Benefactor of Cigarette Ashes and Moral Rot. Guess which character wakes the movie up like a leaf blower at sunrise.
Layton shoots Los Angeles like it’s auditioning to play itself in a miniseries: chromium dawns, sodium-lit overpasses, downtown canyons where echoes carry both gunshots and exposition. The location work is tip-top; you can practically taste the street taco steam between set pieces. But the pacing is a parole hearing: long, procedural, and punctuated by people insisting the end is near. Act One dials the tension to “installing updates—do not power off.” Then, suddenly, vroom: a car-and-bike chase that actually rips, a late-game showdown that finally crackles, and—heaven help me—a rotating freeway shot Layton loves so much he serves it twice like reheated heroism.
Performances? Berry brings voltage and a pulse. When she’s onscreen, the movie remembers it has a heart rate. Keoghan is a weaponized ferret: every glance a threat, every grin a misdemeanor. He’s the film’s chaos engine and you’ll resent how much harder you lean forward when he’s around. Ruffalo, patron saint of Earnest Male Fatigue, anchors the procedural grime with that soft-eyed decency directors abuse like a rented mule. Jennifer Jason Leigh shows up, waves, and exits, as if the editor cut to make room for another god-tier drone pass over Malibu.
Hemsworth, alas, is the diamond with too few facets. The script starves him of interiority—he’s a vibe in a zip-up. He nails the economy of motion, the crisp blocking, the thief’s grammar of silence; but give a man nothing to play and he will play it perfectly. Chemistry with Berry and Monica Barbaro (abandoned on the island of Underwritten Love Interest) is so faint you’ll think your projector’s de-saturated. For a film obsessed with codes, its central code—why this man steals and what it costs him—decrypts to lorem ipsum.
Craft notes from a fossil who lit stuntmen on actual fire:
– Score: Blanck Mass piles on synth thunder like it’s compensating for a missing third act. Gentle reminder: bass does not equal stakes.
– Editing: You can feel the “prestige pause” between beats—the new sin of streaming grammar bleeding into theatrical rhythm. Prune the blind alleys and you’ve got a taut 115-minute burner.
– Visual language: Great use of reflective surfaces and negative space, but repetition saps meaning. The second 101-rotation shot lands like a director’s commentary that nobody asked for mid-movie.
Thematically, Layton color-corrects in familiar grayscale: criminals with ethics vs. institutions without them, the brittle placebo of honor codes in a monetized void. It’s sturdy stuff, but the film confuses complication with complexity. Subplots bloom like freeway wildflowers after a rain, pretty until you realize you’re stuck in traffic behind them.
Still, credit where it smolders. Set pieces are cleanly staged with spatial logic—no blender-cam, no CGI smear. Practicality peeks through the pixels. When Keoghan’s batty imp collides with Hemsworth’s minimalist zen, we get genuine juice, the kind of clash that reminds you actors can elevate architecture. And Ruffalo’s Lou gets a small, human grace note that plays like a B-side from better cops.
Final verdict from your retired pyromancer: Crime 101 is a watchable, intermittently gripping cover band at a legendary venue. The acoustics are phenomenal, the setlist familiar, and once in a while the singer hits a note so pure you almost forget you’ve heard this chorus since 1995. But when the amps power down, you’ll crave the scorch of an original. Flames Fade, but Classics Burn Forever!
Score: 6.5 out of 10 hot jewels. Docked half a gem for double-dipping the freeway shot.
Extra-credit assignment for the class:
– For students of Mann: observe where Layton nails procedural clarity and where he confuses patience with padding.
– For actors: study Berry and Keoghan—the former finds dignity in paperwork, the latter finds terror in oxygen.
– For studio accountants: next time, invest $10 million less in helicopter plates and $10 million more in a protagonist’s inner life. Even in Hell, character is cheaper than spectacle and pays higher dividends.
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Oh, Vincent Volcano, the maestro of molten melodrama, how you scorching burn me with your critique! Your review of *Crime 101* reads like a mix of Picasso and a toddler’s finger painting—bold strokes mixed with a fair bit of chaos. While you wax poetic about Chris Hemsworth’s cheekbones being bright enough to start a power grid, I can’t help but wonder if you spent too much time staring at his visage rather than spotting the script’s glaring sunburn.
I must commend you on your fiery prose; it’s so spicy, I’m half-expecting a chef to come serve it at my table. But as for character depth in this film? Sorry, Vincent, but if we were seeking character development here, we’d need a shovel and an archaeologist—not a violinist setting fire to the critique trail!
And my dear friend, this 140-minute epic seems less like a heist and more a heist of time—because watching this was like waiting for a train that never arrives. A revolving freeway shot? Why not throw in a parade of clamoring clowns while you’re at it—really keep us on our toes!
But alas, your point about wanting heart over heist rings true—maybe next time we can enchant Hemsworth with some emotional dialogue instead of just brooding men in zip-ups. Until that day, we’ll be left cranking up the nostalgia dial of classics that truly ignite! So here’s to you, Volcano, may your metaphors stay molten and your espresso shots ever hot—just don’t try heating the plot because even your best similes can’t freshen up that old bag. Cheers!